BootDigest Such a frustrating disappointment

VividSimon Simply Perfect

Gurlyndrobb While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

Quiet Muffin This movie tries so hard to be funny, yet it falls flat every time. Just another example of recycled ideas repackaged with women in an attempt to appeal to a certain audience.

MisterWhiplash I think that if I had seen this, I don't know, ten or more years ago, I wouldn't have this association but, watching Les vampires, maybe the first real groundbreaking piece of epic filmmaking to come out of France during the "pre-sound" era (I don't know about all of Europe since Cabiria was a year before and, come to think of it, this director also did Fantomas just before this, so I may be off completely)... this all seems like the precursor to countless graphic novels (think of the hardboiled stuff but also Superman and Batman to an extent in those worlds) and other pulp serials. In a way this is in league or the same ballpark as Fritz Lang's Dr. Mabuse: The Gambler, which is also a story of arch criminals and the cops and newspapermen on their trails, and both have an approach to storytelling that is plot driven (though Louis Feuillade is especially concerned with the storytelling twists and turns and mounting of suspense more than Lang, who could pause more often for creating mood and atmosphere). It's a story that is a procedural of the hunt AND about the criminals - and is really about, in each 'episode', drawing out the suspense of a moment and a beat and how, as we can assume, someone will get out of the jam they've been put in, whether that's the criminal or the intrepid Globe writer Philippe Gerande (even that seems to have been echoed years later in certain comic books).So much happens in the seven hours of this "film" (I'll call it that, but put quotes around it as it's technically a serial, but hey, it's a full work at the end of it all), and to recount every turn of the story would miss the point of its effectiveness. The interest in Feuillade's stories is to draw the audience in finding more clues on the Gerande's side - and, eventually, the former undertaker Mazamette with his mustache and nose and (a little too much) looking at the camera for audience emphasis as his sometimes partner - and then, perhaps daringly, into how the vampires work on their end. There's equal time spent between Gerande's side of the story, as well as some of the other characters connected with him like his mother (there's a terribly exciting episode where she gets kidnapped by the vampires and how she gets out of it is fantastic as it relies on a plant earlier that gets paid off, so to speak, that we almost don't expect), and then on the side of Irma Vep, the non-vampire-but-still-very-much-criminal Moreno, and the others like the villainous scientist who Irma ultimately falls for, and Satanas, the "Grande Vampire" of them all.What this does is not so much make us feel more sympathetic to them, they are the villains in a story that isn't subtle about drawing the distinctions between good and not, but to have us understand them as people, however they might be duplicitous in their line of operations, and a character like Irma Vep becomes the most memorable thing about this all for a reason. The actress, called only 'Musidora', has wild eyes that can pierce through anything, and how she moves around a space or a room, and then how those eyes can connect with someone, transforms the space she's in. Why does she do these acts of robbery and cat-thievery (more on that in a second), and, eventually, killing or at least by association? Because she can, just like all the other vampires. There's no grand political statement to what they do, outside perhaps of their disregard for morals or being 'proper' (there's a practically ritualistic dance that the characters do in the middle of a room that gets repeated), and she's that classic comic-book sort of villainess: cunning, ruthless, sometimes vicious, also playful, and in her 1915 way sexy as hell (her in that black suit, man). If any of the Batman writers and creators saw this, it'd be clear as day she was the inspiration for Catwoman (I have no way of knowing that, it's an assumption I'm reading in to).Louis Feuillade isn't exactly out for the *most* realistic depiction of a story of criminals and heroes, but it also sees cinema as an art form to be used for the utmost effect to give information (there's a great many newspaper clipping to look at to move the plot forward), and he's creating his own simple and effective cinematic grammar to keep the audience invested. This doesn't mean the series isn't without some share of flaws, much as a run of a graphic novel series might run out of steam closer to the latter issues, like introducing some new characters fairly late into the game (i.e. Mazamette's son Eustache is an annoyance, and Philippe's eventual fiancé is clearly there to be used, sooner rather than later, as another figure to be kidnapped by the vampires). It'd also be advised to not watch it all in one sitting but to parse it out if you can over a few nights; some of the turns and twists - and physicality like at times falling out of windows (watch out for that noose coming your way to pull you down!) - are repetitive. All this noted, it's still a tremendous achievement in pulp fiction storytelling, with the stakes and drama building up more and more as the episodes go on, and if you can buy into some (though not all) of the acting of the period there's a lot of amazing work done as well, most of all by Musidora, but also the actresses in the later episodes do wonderfully too.

Jackson Booth-Millard Listed near the beginning of the book 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die, I was fooled by the image of woman with dark eyes and teeth showing into thinking this was an early silent horror film, made before Nosferatu, but I still liked it even though it wasn't. Basically it is a six hour thirty-nine minute serial, a long film split into ten parts, The Severed Head, The Killer Ring, The Red Cypher, The Ghost, The Escaping Dead Man, The Hypnotic Gaze, Satanas, The Thunder Lord, The Poisoner and Bloody Wedding. It all revolves around an intrepid reporter and his loyal friend doing a little investigation, but mainly a society of criminals called The Vampires. The gang of criminals are led by Le Grand Vampire (Jean Aymé), and one of the most well known members is fake stage actress and Femme Fetale, Irma Vep (Musidora), her name is an anagram of the word "vampire". Memorable moments in the serial include a few bodies carried on back, Irma Vep dressed as a bat, a box with a head in it (maybe Se7en was inspired), chases on rooftops, Irma Vep in the back skintight catsuit doing her dirty work, the swapping of the back costumes and the sleeping bodies, amongst other things. Also starring Édouard Mathé as Philippe Guérande, Marcel Lévesque as Oscar Mazamette, Fernand Herrmann as Juan-José Moréno, Stacia Napierkowska as Marfa Koutiloff and Renée Carl as L'Andalouse. As one of the earliest ever French silent films, this is an impressive picture that relies solely on the actors and their facial expressions, some writing, and quite a bit of action, including a little stunt work, and it does all add up to an interesting must see. Very good!

Cineanalyst Serials are a low point in film history, and the period around the Great War was bad for the French film industry, as well. Commemorating both is "Les Vampires," probably one of the best-remembered serials and the most accessible French motion picture of any kind from its era.Serials are banal sensationalism aimed at lowbrow tastes. They always have been, from their inception in magazines, newspapers and other cheap literature, which has continued to this day with television. It's always been economical--promising return customers looking for a satisfying wrapping up of previous installments' cliffhangers and loose ends. Usually, the budgets for them are quite thrifty. Additionally, it doesn't require much imagination if one repackages the same devices for each episode--and even less if one repackages the same devices from previous serials--all of which Louis Feuillade, more or less, did here. In many ways, TV series are today's serials.Feuillade further popularized serials in France, which was probably inescapable anyhow with the flood of American films (and serials) into the cinemas. For some reason, he seems to have garnered more respect than any other maker of chapter plays has--even to this day. I don't know of any other director mostly known for serials offhand. His pictures have had widespread popularity in their day, but also "Les Vampires" seems to remain one of the most praised representations of 1910s cinema. It's not evident that it has anything to do with a mastery of film-making, though; to the contrary, I think that's absent. The long takes from fixed camera positions get very boring, especially the scenes of extended length--those of the characters' every action: scaling buildings, driving off in automobiles, how exactly they go about their crimes and such, as fellow commenter tedg and others have described. This is similar to the practice in early cinema that film historians have called the "operational aesthetic," but which was dated even by 1915.As other filmmakers did, Feuillade alters tinting to suggest changes of light within the story. Other filmmakers, especially those in Denmark, actually changed the lighting of the scene for the change in light within the scene, which usually required a well-positioned splice. Otherwise, like Feuillade, Danish filmmakers from around this time tended to avoid editing and camera movement, too, but they replaced it with innovations in mise-en-scène, which aid the camera in creating brilliant images, as can editing and movement of the camera. Such innovation, staging, composition, or mastery is lacking in "Les Vampires." The actors do all the work, and the camera just sits there.You might, but I don't like this serial's content, either. It's a series of convoluted story lines involving a reporter detective and his sidekick Mazamette (played by an awful mugger of an actor) trying to rid Paris of Irma Vep and the underworld criminal gang known as the "vampires." To me it seems to be nearly seven hours of each side ineptly attempting to capture, imprison or kill the other.In episode eight: Why did they give Mazamette's child a gun, and why did they originate such an elaborate scheme to arrest the bad guy in the first place? Why would they use a kid? Where was a gun in the hands of a decent shot when it should have been in other scenes? And, the vampires require a justice to arrive after enough time has been provided for possible escape to declare their prisoner guilty, although, to their credit, they never do that again. Anyhow, you see my point.(*Review title taken from "The Serial Speaks," New York Dramatic Mirror, which is quoted in the chapter on serials in "The Oxford History of World Cinema.")

tedg I suppose it behooves us to know the history of cinema. Its not that long and some of this early stuff had unintended and possibly outrageous influence.The situation was that in the ten years prior there were all sorts of possibilities for film. It could have been an extension of painting, of dance, of photography (which then had a strong artistic tradition). But "birth of a nation" terminated all futures (at least until recently) and froze film as an extension of theater. That's a crying shame.This series is one of many varieties of drama that followed that final freezing. The template comes from magazine serials, still influenced by the Conan Doyle influence of the Holmes stories. There had to be secret cabals of thieves with extraordinary, inscrutable powers. There had to be a detective, in this early incarnation still a reporter. There had to be incredible devices and poisons and tricks. Shady getaways and hair-raising escapes.But those magazine series were drek, and so is this. But stuck it has, and the episodic adventures of TeeVee detectives — especially those of the sixties — followed the pattern. In fact, the pattern even extended to vast periods of time just watching people walk, climb (we have to see the whole thing) and run. In modern times, this extended to the convenient TeeVee filler of watching the detectives walk to their car, get in, start up and drive away. We have to see the entire thing. There's no art here, no innovation in framing, tone... any element. Just a history lesson in how the banal became acceptable.Ted's Evaluation -- 1 of 3: You can find something better to do with this part of your life.